State law requires Jekyll Island officials to count marsh as land when calculating how much of the state park is open to development, Georgia’s attorney general said Thursday.

Olens’ opinion rejects the conclusion of a task force appointed by the Jekyll Island Authority that said in April that the island long ago overstepped its maximum footprint for development. The group said Jekyll officials for decades wrongly included hundreds of acres of marsh in the island’s total acreage as if they were dry land.

At issue is a 1971 law that mandates that only 35 percent of Jekyll Island’s total land area can be used for hotels, golf courses and other development. While the law doesn’t say how large the island is or define “land,” Sam Olens ruled, nowhere does it say marsh can or should be excluded from the island’s total acreage. And there’s plenty of marsh that stands above mean high tide, the marker specified by law for measuring the island’s boundaries.

“Excluding ‘marsh’ from Jekyll’s measurement would constitute an inappropriate alteration of the statutory language,” Olens said in his opinion.

Conservationists vowed to keep pushing for further limits on development on the island. Pierre Howard, president of the Georgia Conservancy, said ultimately “only the courts can interpret the law with full force and effect.”

“Our opinion hasn’t changed and our fight for Jekyll Island will continue,” Howard, a former Georgia lieutenant governor, said in a statement.

The question over Jekyll Island’s size arose as the authority works on a new master plan to guide future conservation, maintenance and development. The last such plan was done 17 years ago. It put the island’s size at 4,226 acres and also found that 32 percent of the land had been developed.

The advisory group of island staff, conservationists and coastal residents said in its April report the island’s total land area is smaller than previously believed — mostly because it removed hundreds of acres of marsh between the water and the island’s western shore from the equation. The task force determined the island is 3,817 acres, a figure that’s 409 acres less than the last total acreage used by the state authority. The new, smaller number would mean 38 percent of Jekyll Island has been developed — about 136 acres over the legal limit.

Olens effectively barred the Jekyll Island Authority from adopting the smaller acreage. But he also warned the authority against using measurements in its new master plan that would substantially increase the island’s acreage without first giving Georgia citizens a chance to weigh in and state lawmakers an opportunity to consider amending the 1971 law.

Howard of the Georgia Conservancy and the Initiative to Protect Jekyll Island State Park, which both had seats on the task force, have said they’re concerned island officials want to use the 2013 master plan to enlarge the amount of land open to new development. Documents the state authority sent to the attorney general included notes from a Jekyll Island staff member saying an alternate method of measuring the island “would result in Jekyll Island being 5,542.6 acres” — a number much larger than the 1996 land area and would yield more than 460 acres open to new construction.

“The practical effect of our opinion is the status quo,” Olens said in a phone interview. “Normally we would just answer the legal question. But we feel Jekyll Island is so important, additional public input is appropriate” before any major change gets made.

Jekyll Island spokesman Eric Garvey said the authority still plans to implement a task force recommendation to classify as developed land the island’s golf course ponds, dirt roads and bike paths that have previously been considered undeveloped. He said it’s still too soon to say what the island’s total acreage in the 2013 master plan will be.

“We have no plans to increase new development on the island,” Garvey said. “And we don’t have any plans to increase the developable acreage.”

David Egan, co-founder of the Initiative to Protect Jekyll Island, predicted state lawmakers will be asked to write into the law exactly how many acres on Jekyll Island can be developed. If the authority truly doesn’t want any new construction on undeveloped land, he said, then “the fixed number of acres should be the number of acres we have developed now.”

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Get the impression that Mr. Olens spends little time around the marsh. What is that, he is "warning" the Jekyll Island Authority? Makes you wonder who Mr. Olens is connected to or where his allegience is, if he is lecturing the people actually down at Jeckll Island.

My opinion is that he has absolutely no idea how fragile the ecosystem is down there. It is probably a miracle the pristine protected parts of the Georgia coast have remained protected for so long. This is sure not the case down in Florida. Georgia should be on guard to not let the ALEC republican types use property development of protected areas as a way to enrich themselves. The DNR should be in this mix somewhere. They are pretty fierce about governing the coast.

Hey Mr. Olens, how come you awaken from slumber to go to bat for property developers, but you sure are not home when it comes to a number of really out front ethical issues at the county level? Who do you work for, because it seems like no official in Georgia cares to keep the governing straight. Most states, it is the job of the AG to oversee the activity in the counties?. People move to Georgia and say, "What is going on here? Why so much lawlessness from the governing persons?" Or maybe I am mistaken.

Develop the Georgia barrier islands? What, are you crazy? The Kennedy's use to come down here and ride 4wheelers on the beach. It was illegal, but they did it.

Could a building permit be obtained to construct a house on this "land" from the DNR ? If it's not develop-able it should not be counted. How many people will sue because their property has been under / over valued and taxed ?

Okay, following the model of the state, I am setting up a gaming business. Who wants to throw in some work money (that should be caring for the family) on odds of how many Jet Skis Mr. Olens owns. Secondary pot, has Mr. Olens ever seen or handled a turtle? And third, has Mr. Olens ever seen plant life so sensitive that it wilts if you stare at it too hard?

Yes, I am being tacky. Silver and quarters welcome. Throw it in the bucket and make it ring. Go see Jedc over at the wooden table over there, he's keeping the bookie count. All proceeds go to support education, after Jed takes a 100k salary and pays all the goons he has working for him. He will even tell you the odds on the front end, about 14:1. You spend $14. and get a dollar in return.

As everybody knows, development is the highest value and goal of a society. Developers are gods, and must not be crossed if one has future political ambitions. Politicians are their servants.
Environmentalists and nature lovers are devils incarnate. They exist just to cause problems for developers and tar the wheels of development. They must be squelched and/or squashed.
Lawyerly high-sounding anti-logical legalese is just one arrow in the quiver. Lawyers always cover their tracks with high sounding legalese that intimidates and confuses the hoi polloi. Very smart men they are, and ambitious.
Scenic ocean vistas are marketable commodities to be sold to the highest bidder.
Maritime forest, with its alligators and ticks, is just in the way of progress toward the highest human goal: development.

Jekyll will certainly improve if hundreds more acres of pristine maritime forest are built upon and paved. Maybe not right now, while everyone is looking, but later, when the voting public turns its attention to more pressing matters other than the fate of a fragile, elegant barrier island. Then the true purpose of civilization--development of every possible square inch--can be reached.
Money can flow over and under the table in rivers and torrents, in the finest tradition of Georgia politics to accomplish this godly purpose of complete devastation of the natural order.

I'm disappointed with but not totally surprised by the AG’s opinion on the marsh -- land issue. It's the AG's job, after all, to defend the state and its various agencies. So, I guess he felt obliged to spin in the JIA's favor the 65-35 law, the Coastal Marshlands Protection Act, the rules of statutory construction, and common sense, each of which indicate that tidal marsh should not be counted as ‘land’ when applying the 65-35 law.

With that said, I'm nonetheless encouraged by the AG’s acknowledgement of the importance of the 65/35 issue to Georgia’s citizens and by his recommendation that any proposal to modify the 1996 Master Plan so as to substantially increase the measured land area of Jekyll and the number of acres eligible for development should be “thoroughly evaluated in a public process and that final action be deferred until the General Assembly has an opportunity to weigh in.” So, it seems like state legislators will have the final say on the Jekyll land area controversy. In an election year, legislators should be more than willing to heed constituent opinion, which certainly will run in favor of supporting the 65-35 law. This whole affair could get really interesting!

Of interest too is the AG’s mention of an idea that has been floated by the Jekyll Island Authority, which is to replace the 65/35 ratio with a fixed number of acres eligible for development. The idea is not w/o merit, but, of course, the question is, would previously untouched land be part of the acreage subject to development. In that regard, the JIA has said repeatedly and publicly that it does not intend to do anything other than redevelop properties within existing footprints. If that’s so, the fixed number of acres the Authority is seeking should approximate the acreage already defined as developed. I'd bet all my nickels that the JIA won't act in accord with its words on the 'existing footprint' claim.